SR540Beaver

Greg, The question that keeps coming to my mind is why are only the boys reporting bad behavior on her part at campouts? How many adults go on the campouts? What is their take on it? Do they have a problem with her behavior? We had 9 adults aside from the SM on our last campout. Actually, 4 of thos adults were in and out of camp because of responsibilities they had running Camporee. But we had plenty of adults around that could have reported bad behavior by any adult or boy at the campout. Is it just the boys that complain or do the adults that go on the campouts complain too?

Packsaddle: What was the reason for the Southern Baptists to split away and form the SBC? Pack, I suspect you already know the answer to that. The short simplified answer to the question is that it formed over the slavery issue and not theological differences. The SBC was formed in 1845 basically because it was felt that the existing Baptist missionary organization would not appoint Southern slave holders to missionary positions. Obviously, a lot has changed over the last 170 years.

Fog, I'll bet you are still using Windows 3.1 on a 486 chip and running Internet Explorer 3. I don't know about your district or council. Barry and I are in different districts, but the same council. Barry is right, Wood Badge isn't desigend to teach you outdoor skills. You have an opportunity to use them, but the focus is on teaching leadership skills. In addition to the standard IOLS course designed to train adults in the skills needed to lead a boy to first class, our council has an OST (Outdoor Skills Training) course that is more advanced skills training. It is very popular and led by very skilled, long time scouters. Foto is also correct. I've been forced to attend all sorts of leadership courses by my employers over the years. Wood Badge was different in that I chose to go and it was applied to something I love and with people I really enjoy being around. Going because your boss says so and going because you want to makes all the difference in the world in what you get out of it.

While I don't want to interpret the BSA guidelines for everyone else, here is my take on it. You don't want a patrol page that has a portrait of each boy that says: Johnny Smith 1st Class Scout 12 years old Attends Baden Powell Jr Hi 1234 Gilwell Lane Anytown, USA 555-1212 jsmith@xyz.com Posting pictures of campouts and activities or even a patrol picture with first names is one thing. Creating a directory of single portraits with how to find, call or e-mail a child is entirely a different situation. I believe that is what the guidelines are trying to protect against. For most folks, this is common sense. But keep in mind that many troop websites are actually created by the boys who might think this is a great way to provide information without realizing there are privacy concerns.

Barry, I think some of it is a matter of perception and tenure. For "old timers" like yourself who have been in Scouting for a number of years and attended the old Woodbadge, you have something to compare the new course to. For guys like me who have only worked in Cubs for a year and a half and just moved to Boy Scouts, I can only go on what I'm just now learning. For me, the patrol method seemed to be heavily emphasized in WB. Everything we did was as a patrol and we did create a pretty tight bond from the start. We stay in contact with one another by e-mail and even have hopes of getting to camp together again one of these days. Our individual Scouting calendars make it rather difficult to find a common time we can all get together for a weekend. But for me, we did so much together as a patrol; I was beginning to ache for a little personal private time. The "free" time we were permitted ended up having to be used for patrol meetings for the different projects we were assigned.

Barry, I was going to send you an e-mail and see how the first weekend went. Sounds like it went well. Am I to assume you are the Troop Guide for the BEAVERS? If so, then they hooked up the best with the best! I loved my course!

FOG, I'm fully aware of and familiar with the Baptist Faith and Message. I even took an elective course in it at the Baptist University where I got my degree in Religion. Back up a page on the website to http://www.sbc.net/bfm/default.asp and read this: "Baptists cherish and defend religious liberty, and deny the right of any secular or religious authority to impose a confession of faith upon a church or body of churches. We honor the principles of soul competency and the priesthood of believers, affirming together both our liberty in Christ and our accountability to each other under the Word of God. Baptist churches, associations, and general bodies have adopted confessions of faith as a witness to the world, and as instruments of doctrinal accountability. We are not embarrassed to state before the world that these are doctrines we hold precious and as essential to the Baptist tradition of faith and practice. FOG, you may see that as a creed, but Baptists see it differently from the creeds of other denominations. It is a set of commonly held beliefs put on paper to describe what most Baptists believe. But it is not mandated or binding on being a member of a Southern Baptist church as other churches view creeds. You say poe-tay-toe, I say poe-tah-toe. Each Southern Baptist church is autonomous and has no hierarchy above it. We are the opposite of the Catholic church in structure. They have a Pope and Bishops who dictate all the way down to the local parish. Baptists have individual churches who send delegates to a convention to elect a president to preside over the convention. The convention serves the purpose of training and sending missionaries, operating seminaries, printing literature, etc. at the direction of the individual churches delegates. It is an upside down pyramid. The Catholic church does not exist without the Pope. The Southern Baptist Convention doesn't exist without the individual churches.

Try and stick with it. Go to your district roundtable and make some contacts with district staff and find out who your unit commissioner is. Call a parents meeting and have a heart to heart with them. Someone on your district staff if not your unit commissioner should be happy to attend and speak to them. Tell the parents that you need people to step up tot he plate if they want their son's pack to survive and grow. Explain to them that you don't want them to volunteer out of guilt. You only want voluteers who can and will put their heart into it and will make a committment to "do their best" for one scout year. Tell them up front that they will be expected to get training at the start. I'm betting that if you have enough folks, the district trainer will be willing to come to you and do the training all at once. Everyone can attend the New Leader Essentials and Youth Protection at the same time. The Cubmaster and Committee training is the same and they can attend it together. All of the Den leaders can attend the Den Leader Specific training together. Throw in Baloo training and you are in business. Try to set aside a Saturday for the training and coordinate it with the trainer and the new volunteers. All that is left is to contact the boys and try to get them to come on a regular basis. If you deliver a fun program, that will take care of itself. If your roundtable is like ours, you will be presented each month with program themes and ideas for the coming month. Once you have a dedicated and trained staff (the hard part), the rest will fall into place and sustained growth will be easy. Set up a school night for the new school year and you won't be able to keep the kids away. We signed up 30 boys at the beginning of this school year. Even several Webelos II's joined. We had our work cut out for us to get them their Arrow of Light by crossover time, but we did it.

FOG, I've been a Southern Baptist all my life. The Southern Baptists are the largest protestant denomination in the world. We don't have a creed.

(We searched the Discipline and did not find a declaration that 'the practice of homosexuality is incompatible with Christian teachings) They might want to sit next to a good lamp and put on their reading specs the next time they read their Bible.

BTW, welcome to the forums Cy!

Well I once defused a nuclear bomb with a paper clip and rubberband with only 3 seconds to spare. That's all I can say, the rest is classified.

FOG, Wrong! I have read the Troop Committee Guide and everything else I can get my hands on. Our own 25 year veteran COR tried to tell me that while that all sounds nice, this is the real world. I told him that I wasn't aware that scouts or scouters could pick and choose or prioritize the pieces of the scout oath and law that they wanted to follow or not follow. If we are to lead by example, then we have an obligation to conduct our committee meetings according to BSA guidelines. We don't get to make it up as we go or do what we think is better. I'd love to work a 10 to 2 workday with a 2 hour lunch, but I don't think the company will go along with my personal policies over their own.

BW, Thank you! Believe it or not, I was trying to be as brief as I could. I had reviewed the Troop Committee Guidebook before the meeting and while I didn't have it with me and read it to them, I did basically paraphrase the chapter and verse of what you said. I don't know that we will start a new troop, but it is an option. One of the pluses is that the church who was our pack's charter does not have a troop. We have an excellent relationship with them and I don't believe we would have any problem getting them to charter a troop. The other plus is that we have all worked together for several years and get along very well together. We are all dedicated to delivering the program per BSA specs.

This is a spin off and update to the thread I started about our troop treasuer throwing a temper tantrum at the committee meeting. Let me refresh the scenario. Our SM went to Iraq during the fall. His wife is the treasurer. I know, I know....it isn't a good thing. It was this way when my son crossed over in February. Our acting SM and his wife who became the Committee chair started in those positions in November when their son crossed over. One of the reasons he crossed so early was because the troop didn't have anyone on the committee or any of the ASM's who would step up to the plate, and his parents are dedicated scouters who gladly filled the gap. The acting SM is an Eagle Scout and is the District Trainer. His wife assists with much of the training. It was because of his recruitment efforts that I and three other leaders from my son's old pack and our sons decided to cross over to our new troop. That made a total of 5 new boys plus a sixth boy from our acting SM's old pack. My son and another existing Boy Scout recruited their best friends to make a total of 8 new scouts. This almost doubled the troop in size since they had done very little recruiting in the last few years. We have a group of 11 to 12 year old boys and a group of 15 to 17 year old boys. Everything was going grand in our new (to us) troop until the committee meeting. The troop is truly boy led, but the committee had been very small and made up of "tenured" parents. The new committee chair (trains for the district) has been attempting to get the committee running by the book. Evidently this didn't sit well with the "old" folks. Especially the treasurer (SM's wife). As I described in the previous thread, she went balistic at the meeting and threw notebooks and bank bags at the chairman, announced that she quit and stormed out. This was our SM's first troop meeting back since going to Iraq. The boys were just feet away from her display. They could hear it, but not see it. Fast forward two weeks to this past Monday night. The SM requested the committee chair to call a special committee meeting. All the interested leadership and parents were there in addition to our unit commissioner (who was in attendance for the blow up) and our COR. The SM said he called everyone there to remind everyone that we ran a boy led troop and the committee exists to facilitate the program and we do what we do for the boys. He then opened the floor for any comments. People danced around the issues for about an hour and 45 minutes. The COR gave his little speech about how the buck stopped with him and we all needed to play well together. Eventually, a few allegations were made against he former acting SM and the committee chair. Seems some of the "tenured" parents felt they were trying to take over and ramrod things. In other words, the chairman didn't rubber stamp the treasurer's recommendation to have people write checks to the scout's parents instead of the troop during fundraisers. This is what she blew up over at the committee meeting when people began to discuss it. She didn't want it discussed, she wanted it adopted without question. They were also accused of spending money to buy some replacement parts for equipment such as lantern globes without first asking the boys. Their idea is that since it is a boy led troop and it is the boys money, nothing can be spent without first getting the boys to agree to it. I can see that if your talking about buying a trailer and wiping out the account. But...lantern globes? The COR mentioned that he was told the meetings were unorganized and had no agenda. That is when I spoke up (I'm still committee chair of my son's old pack) to say that she was holding meetings exactly as the Troop Committee Guidebook says they should be run. Thankfully, she was able to whip out the agendas for the last several months. Then questions arose concerning who could and couldn't VOTE in committee meetings. I referred to my recollection of discussions here at scouter. com and mentioned that know where in the literature does it say the committee functions by vote. The COR (a 25 year scouting veteran who just received his Silver Beaver) informed me that this is the real world and the democratic method was the best way to get things done. I reminded him that there are plenty of people who scoff at the possibility of boys leading themselves too, but we sure work hard to make it happen. It didn't help, I was just talking pie in the sky actually expecting the committee to operate by consensus. The COR evetually decided he had said all he needed to and excused himself for us to work things out. The unit commisioner finally spoke up and said we still had one matter to resolve. The real matter that the meeting was called for in the first place and that we had danced around for almost 2 hours. The District Commissioner had gone to the treasuers house and relieved her of the books following her tantrum. The unit commissioner wanted to know who was the treasuer and who did he turn the books over to. Almost like it was rehearsed, the "tenured" parents all called the treasuer's name out. The chair siad no, she quit. Several people went on to explain that it was a miscommunication, she quit the meeting, not the job. Someone called for a vote, it was seconded and approved by majority vote. You could have knocked me over with a feather. These people have been nothing but nice to all of us newcomers since we all crossed over. The campouts have been a blast. I was shocked and appalled that they would stab these two people in the back the way they did and reward this ladies childish behavior the way they did. These two people spend at least 5 night a week doing district and council work. It was an imposition on them to volunteer to help this troop out when no one else would step to the plate and this is the thanks they got. Obviously, they resigned their positiones with the troop that night. So far, they have not pulled their son out. I know this is long, but here is my quandry. I've lost sleep over this. I've lost my appetite over it. It was actually hard for me to put on my uniform and go to the troop meeting the next night. All of the new leaders felt the same way. I think things happened too fast for the troop. They were a good boy led troop with dedicated leaders and a good reputation. But all of a sudden, they inherit five new leaders and eight boys almost overnight. This happens while the SM is gone and it is what he came back to. I'm sure it was disorienting to him and I'm sure his wife didn't like having his world changed without his knowledge. I also came away from the meeting with the distinct feeling that the SM (who really is a great guy and great with the boys) sees us as Cubbers who have no clue and want to turn the troop into a big pack. I had noticed everytime he was around us, he kept pointing out that the troop was boy led. Geez, that is one of the main reasons we joined the troop in the first place. I even spoke up in the meeting to say that there was no one in the room who didn't understand, appreciate, desire and support a boy led troop. I fear that the "distrust" of the acting SM and now former chair extends to those of us who they recruited. Privately, we hve been knocking around the idea of either staying and giving it time, all of us moving to a troop that doesn't feel threatened by new growth or starting our own troop. We have five leaders and at least six boys. One final note. Here is what this troop will be missing out on if we leave. First of all, 6 great boys who are excited about being Boy Scouts. Secondly, they will loose 5 Woodbadgers who are all leader specific trained. Out of those 5 leaders, they will lose a former Cubmaster, a former Pack Committee Chair, a former Pack Treasurer, 4 former Den leaders, 1 Eagle scout, 1 District Training Chair, i District Training Vice Chair, 2 training assistants, a former webmaster, 2 popcorn kernels, 4 Pow Wow leaders and 2 future Jamboree ASM's. That is just the stuff I can think of off the top of my head. Can you imagine having that kind of talent and dedication walking thru your door and fall in your lap and then alienating it for the age old reason of.....we never did it that way before? Sorry to make this so long, but I need to get it off my chest and out of my head. Comments?

Scout camping in RV's and Suburbans? Even in Cubs? Never heard of it. I guess you could do it if you didn't go to a scout property. Our scout properties only allow vehicles in camp to unload and load. Then they have to be taken to the parking area.

Hops, I have not read thru the BSA website guidlines recently, so I don't know if my content suggestion violates any policy. Something that really irritates me when visiting Troop sites is when they do not have any location or contact information. Since I am busy trying to recruit boys for the 2005 Jamboree, it would sure be nice to know when, where and what time a troop meets. Also, names and phone numbers for adult leadership. If they don't want to list their phone number, then at least an e-mail address. Take a look around at many troop websites and you'll notice that this type of information is often missing. Your troop website can be a possible method for new boy recruitment if you provide info on how to find you and who to contact. Oh yeah, list your city and state too. That often gets left off.

Just out of curiousity, have his parents sought any professional help for his problem? As Scouters, we all do our best to provide a quality program to all boys equally. But we often become part of a boy"s "therapy" for attempts to provide ADD or ADHD boys with activity or to provide socialization for anti-social kids. While these boys need the help and scouting can be an excellent resource for this help; too many parents dump their kids off on scouting and don't participate. I too thought of a screened room. However, that has it's limitations of you backpack. Also, if your troop provides tents, then you are stuck with having to provide a special accomidation for a particular scout. Inclement weather is another problem with a screened room. While BSA prefers that boys camp in their patrols, there is no rule against a boy sharing a tent or shelter with their own parent. Perhaps the parent needs to step up and go along on campouts to handle this special need. Now, please don't flame me for mentioning ADD or ADHD. I have no problem with boys who have problems like this being in the troop. But some do honestly present problems that sometimes require parental control instead of expecting the leadership to have to constantly give special attention to.

I have used the thick plastic sheeting bought from the local harware store. It worked well, but I didn't like the way it folded. I eventually bought a waterproofed nylon tarp that I really like. It has grommets around the side so it can be used as a covering tarp, a dining fly or shelter in addition to a ground cloth. It is lightweight and easy to fold compactly. The store I bought it at had them in several sizes ans I bought one that was slightly smaller than the floor of my tent. I know that many scouters here already know this, but it bears being said again. DO NOT cut a footprint bigger than your tent and leave the edges sticking out from underneath your tent. The purpose of a ground cloth is to protect your floor and creat a moisture barrier under the tent. When you leave material sticking out from the edges of the tent walls, the water pours down the tent and gets captured by the ground cloth. Now you have a layer of water trapped between your ground cloth and tent floor. Just what you were trying to prevent! I'm always amazed at how many experienced scouts and scouters I see doing this.

Unless they want double the fun.

BW, Was your last post in response to me???? If so, you were reading without your glasses. I'm not talking about troops that are not delivering the program. I'm not talking about troops promoting Venturing to their boys. I made myself very clear that I'm talking about a boy from a good troop who wants even more than the good program his troop provides. Let me put it this way, if you have a boy who loves camping and high adventure and wanted to go every weekend, is your troop going to provide that to him? If you say yes, how many other people are going to be as gung ho and go along every weekend? If no, then does that mean you are not providing a good program? No, you have an excellent program. You just have one kid who wants even more than your good program provides. That is not indicitive of a bad program. You can't be everything to everybody. In fact, that boy won't find a troop anywhere that is going to provide that to him. His solution since a boy can't be dual registered in two troops......join a Venturing Crew to satisfy his greater than usual need for outdoor activities. The two programs can co-exist and compliment each other. National obviously thinks so.....or they wouldn't have allowed for boys to be members of both at the same time.

BW, I wasn't suggesting taking a boy away from his troop. I said the boy might want more of what he is getting in the troop. Why camp once when you can camp twice? Realistically, how many troops do you know of that does high adventure twice a month? 24 outings? How many adult volunteers are going to be able to swing it? And yes, I know that the patrol can camp on their own without an adult. But again, how many troops do you know where that is a common practice. For some scouts, Venturing can and is a nice compliment to the troop. It does not have to be one or the other. Also, how many troops experience signing up 16 or 17 year olds? Do you think a Venturing Crew is going to be able to attract a large number of them too? By the time I turned 16, I had a job where I worked evenings and weekends and had a car payment. Unless I found somone willing to let me off for scouting, I wouldn't be able to participate. The kind of jobs that were available when I was 16 were service industry jobs and the hours available were evenings and weekends. Mandatory and inflexable. If I didn't want the job, they had a waiting list of kids who did. I just don't think there is that big of a market for attracting older boys fresh into Venturing. The majority of boys going to Venturing will most likely come from Scouting. Remember, I said most. The possibilty exists for bringing in boys who were not in scouting, but I think the odds are against you.

Having been involved with my son's sports twice as long as his scouting, I can atrst to the fact that sports fundraising runs into the same problems as scouting. Many parents don't want to be burdened with the effort and want to write a check. We had parents and boys who flat out refused to participate in sports fundraising. I'd just as soon write a check, but don't. I bring my son's fundraisers to work with the stipulation that he has to sell as much or more than me on his own. I won't let him opt out of fundraising even if he wants to. On the other hand, he sold almost $800 worth of sausage and chicken fingers a month ago and we barely crammed (literally) it all into two freezers. If he had sold more, I don't know where we would have put it. I had to take a half day of vacation to go home and load all the sausage people at work bought and deliver it. I also had to take off work early to go pick the sausage up to store at my house. Then I had to drive him all over to deliver in our neighborhood....several times. Yes he earned $140 in his account and learned some valuable lessons....again. But I sur would have liked writing a check and being done with it. I've got enough aggrevations in life witout being the sausage king of OKC.

BW, I don't want to speak for Barry, But I do think I understand what he is saying. A boy loves his troop and scouting. He enjoys his patrol, the meetings and the monthly outing. He likes it so much that he wants more of it. He joins a crew so he can get a second weekend of outdoor activities packed into his month. I once knew a guy who loved softball so much that he was on two teams and filled in on a couple of others when needed. He loved softball, but being a member on just one team didn't give him as many games as he wanted. So he joined a second team and played twice as much ball. I think that is what Barry is talking about. That does not indicate that the scout unit's program is bad. It means that you gave the scout such a love for scouting that he wants more of it. What would you do to fulfill this scouts desire, add a second campout per month?

FOG, Perhaps you should follow your advice to BW about getting that training. All I can say is that they are two different programs with two different set or rules. Why do you think they should be the same? Do baseball and football have the same set of rules?